The Eclipse

After a whirlwind tour of London to try to see all my old pals in 3 days, I’m now in Cannes as the festival kicks off tonight. Screen’s office has moved to the Majestic this year for anyone looking for us! I’ll be working non-stop for Screen during the days but hoping to see old friends. And who knows, maybe even a film or two eventually.

Anyway, before Cannes kicks off I wanted to blog about the Tribeca highlight for me this year, Conor McPherson’s The Eclipse. I heard pre-fest from the programmers that this one was a key film to watch out for, and I interviewed McPherson a few weeks before TFF started and I could tell that he was very passionately proud of the film and hearing him describe the unusual tone of the piece had me further intrigued. So when I did see it, it proved to be a slow dramatic thriller punctuated by some genre (horror) elements. Some audience members hated those I guess, but for me they somehow drew one further into the depths of grief that this character was struggling with. Ciaran Hinds was fantastic. Days, even weeks later, this film has still stuck with me. Magnolia picked it up for the US so keep an eye out for the theatrical release.

Other highlights of Tribeca for me were Soderbergh’s The Girlfriend Experience and Ianucci’s In The Loop. Overall, I thought it was a great year for TFF.